The present system employs a Ubiquitous Sensor Network (USN) technique, which is operated by using a reader (reader for vehicles, freight trains, freight ships and so on) having a reception function of wirelessly exchanging information with a wireless terminal device having unique information and a management processor embedded therein in a state where various sensors related to security and crime prevention are connected thereto, a GPS function of generating position information, a module function (such as for CDMA, GSM and satellite communication) of gaining access to a commercial communication network and performing communication, and so on.
The USN is a network system configured to wirelessly collect information sensed by various sensors. The USN technique is a high-level technique as compared with a technique of perceiving the flow of various pieces of physical distribution information by attaching tags to things based on a Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technique in order to perceive the flow of physical distribution. RFID includes a tag having unique information embedded therein, a reader, a network and so on, and is used to process information by identifying a thin plane tag attached to a thing based on magnetic or electrical fields without physical contact. Thus, RFID is advantageous in that there is no damage, which may occur due to friction caused by contact, there is a low possibility of contamination, and recognition is possible even in a moving object moving at high speed. Accordingly, in recent years, there has been a rapid increase of the need for a systematic physical distribution management system for enhancing physical distribution competitiveness. Thus, there has been provided a physical distribution management system based on a wireless network technology in which such RFID is applied to position tracking of physical distribution in conjunction with RF communications such as GPS.
Techniques employing both such RFID and the wireless network include Korean Patent Application Nos. 10-2003-0055064 and 10-2003-0079001. In these prior arts, a RFID tag including article information is attached to an article and the position of the article is recognized when a specific frequency is sensed, or a product code detected from a RFID tag is transmitted via a wireless network.
However, the prior arts are not suitable for the safety or management of a physical distribution system of containers that move a long distance because a position is simply tracked or information is transmitted based on the RFID tag.
In particular, the amount of physical distribution mounted in containers for export is huge and necessary environments, such as temperature and humidity, are of various kinds depending on the types of articles. Thus, there is an urgent need for the development of a system, which can maintain specific internal environments set according to long-distance transportation for a predetermined time and immediately cope with any problems.
Further, in the case of physical distribution exported to the U.S., etc., for security management of containers in view of safety, regulations are becoming under tighter control, such as that it is obliged to use eSeal of a type in which a mechanical seal is combined with the conventional RFID. However, it is difficult to prepare solutions to forgery, replication, etc. and it is therefore necessary to enhance safety and management functions.